July 28, 2025 | Program Update
That’s a wrap! Our Pathfinder Immersion Program (PIP) participants celebrated the end of an INCREDIBLE season with a talent show and award ceremony at Charleston Day School last Friday. We also said some tearful goodbyes to our amazing PIP intern coaches, BB, Donovan, Larry, Maddi, and Sam, who will hopefully come back and join us again next year!
Our Pathfinders, grades 6-10, have been meeting Monday-Friday for STEM activities, professional enrichment, and golf instruction. We will continue meeting with these young people each summer and on Saturdays throughout the school year until they graduate high school. Some of our Pathfinders have been with us for 5 summers already, and it has been a joy to watch them grow—as golfers, students, and friends.
Pathfinder Immersion Program curriculum is designed to inspire curiosity and personal growth, on and off the golf course. Our most recent summer session featured a variety of engaging enrichment activities and memorable field trips.
Camp kicked off in June with team-building games at Charleston Day School, which functioned as our home base for the summer. This is our third year utilizing Charleston Day’s space, and we truly couldn’t do all that we are doing without the continued support of Catherine Skeen and the Charleston Day team.
Our courageous Pathfinders put their trust in each other and their coaches to the test with a fieldtrip to the James Island County Park climbing wall and challenge course.
Our Pathfinders enjoyed a series of routine activities each week including etiquette classes, chess lessons, mock trial practice, Topgolf playdays with mentors (mentor activities generously sponsored by the HV3 Foundation), and STEM activities (coordinated in partnership with YoArt and Frank Hatten from Boeing SC’s Dream Learner Program).
Golf instruction, led by Coach Jensen Tomberlin, included visits to Old Barnwell, Seabrook Island Club, Wild Dunes, Berkeley Country Club, Patriots Point Golf Links, Legend Oaks Golf Club, TIPS Golf Club, and CHS Golf. Many thanks to our golf course and simulator club partners for hosting us, and special thanks to the Yeamans Hall Club pros for joining us at Patriots Point for the second year in a row!
Off-course enrichment activities, organized by our Director of Community Outreach and PIP Lead Coach, Lerone Johnson, exposed Pathfinders to diverse topics and industries. We learned about engineering and armored vehicles from our friends at DES. We spent a day with Frampton to learn about construction and visited Seafox to learn about boat design and manufacturing processes. Synovus led a financial education class to get our Pathfinders thinking about spending habits, and we got a healthy dose of science from MUSC and the College of Charleston, including a visit with MUSC’s horticulture therapy program and hands-on learning at CofC thanks to the NASA Space Grant Consortium. We also enjoyed a boat tour of the ACE Basin National Estuarine Research Reserve thanks to DNR.
We look forward to adding a new class of rising 6th grade students to this camp next summer! Join our email list for alerts about Pathfinder Immersion Program enrollment for 2026.
To learn more about how you can play a part the continued growth of our Pathfinder Immersion Program and educational enrichment opportunities, please contact Conor O’Rourke.
